I woke up early and caught the Manchester derby that started at 4:30 am. Originally, I was only planning to watch the first half before starting my road trip. However, the match was just too entertaining to stop after the first half. I ended up watching the whole thing which ended in a Man United win 2-1. That equalizing goal by Bruno Fernandes should've totally been wiped out with Marcus Rashford being offside. Sure, he didn't touch the ball or impede an opponent's ability to reach the ball, but he was in clear possession of the ball! I'm pretty sure that they will revise the rule to get rid of this technicality. I hit the road at about 6:30 am.
For this road trip, I was borrowing my parents' Tesla which had a longer range battery. However, the full range (~355 miles) wasn't utilized as it would turn out that how far I would drive in any given stretch was determined by my bladder! My first pitstop had me at the Tesla Supercharger in Indio. When I parked and plugged in for a charge, I noticed that they were in the middle of putting in a significant amount of new charging stalls.
Indio, CA
There weren't any good deals on the McDonald's app, so I decided to get breakfast at Starbucks. I ordered the usual bacon, sausage & egg wrap and an Americano. After I was done with my food, I used the restroom before returning to my car. I had to first get the code from an employee to open the restroom.
My next pitstop brought me just across the border at the Tesla Supercharger in Ehrenberg, AZ. Once again, I totally forgot that Arizona doesn't observe daylight savings, so they were ahead one hour. After plugging in the car for a charge, I walked over to the Flying J Travel Center. After using the restroom, I bought 2 bottles of Arizona green tea for $4 before heading back to my car.
Ehrenberg, AZ
Traffic was great until I approached Buckeye where the traffic all of sudden slowed to a crawl. I saw that the Watson Rd exit was closed and the 2 lanes eventually became 1 lane, but other than that I saw no reason as to why it would be that slow through that section as there wasn't any construction being done on a Saturday.
Once I got through that bottleneck, the traffic flowed once more. Parking options around the Phoenix Convention Center were mostly expensive parking lots or metered street parking. I couldn't find any street parking on the first pass, so I opted for parking structure at the Arizona Center. I entered via Fillmore St after turning right on 3rd St. I parked at one of the EV stalls even though I wasn't going to plug in for a charge.
Arizona Center parking structure
From there, I walked down to the convention center. I followed other people ahead of me and apparently entered the North Building. I used one of the restrooms and eventually came across a convention center employee where she told me that I had to cross Washington St and enter the South Building.
Expo at the Phoenix Convention Center
I picked up my race packet as well for my friend. Along my way through the official merchandise area, I found my name on one of the sweatshirts. Then I moved on to the rest of the expo to visit the vendor booths. There wasn't anything that I needed or stood out. Then when I got to the Rock n' Roll area, I didn't feel the need to register for next year's race. The date also fell on the same weekend as the Disneyland Half Marathon which was finally returning in 2024! I definitely didn't want to miss that race! I looked for information about the race in the State of Washington, but it looks like there will not be a race in 2023.
Expo goodie bag
Race shirt
Found my name
After getting back to my car, I started my drive out to WorldMark Phoenix - South Mountain Preserve. While getting out of the parking structure, the ticket kiosk had a hard time reading my credit card. It finally went through on the 4th attempt where my card was charged for $4.
I came across a ton of road construction as I reached the vacation rental property. Per the usual with WorldMark properties, the check-in process went really smoothly. I was assigned an accessible unit #144. I didn't need any special accommodations, but this was the only availability. I'm sure it'll be a welcomed feature after running the marathon. After getting my room card keys and a remote for the garage, I stopped by the concierge station. Since I was a VIP owner, she tried to offer me a bottle of wine. When I told her that I don't drink, she gave me a pound of chocolate with the choice of with or with almonds. She also gave me an insulated lunch bag and allowed me to grab a few bags of snacks from a basket. Then she offered a $100 AMEX gift card to attend an owner update. I asked if that's even possible since I just went to one last weekend. She told me that I couldn't attend an owner update at the same property on back to back weekends and since this was a different property, I was good to go. Of course, I didn't have the will to resist especially when they were going to give me $100. She assured me that the update would only last no longer than 55 minutes.
VIP owner
Insulated lunch bag and snacks
For an early dinner, I decided to just drive over to the nearby In-n-Out to pick up a couple of burgers. I joined the very long drive-thru line. That was pretty standard for any In-n-Out restaurant. When it was my turn to order, I got 2 Double Doubles, both with onions. Once I returned back to my unit, I enjoyed the burgers while watching one of my favorite movies, You've Got Mail!
Double Double x2
You've Got Mail!
After finishing my meal, I laid out my flat runner for tomorrow's marathon, took a shower, and prepared to call it a night. While laying out my stuff, I noticed that I had forgotten to pack my Shotbloks. That just means that I'll have to be careful not to red-line it too much during the first half of the race or I'll bonk really hard without any nutrition on me.
Flat runner
Sunday 1/15
I left my unit at about 6:15 am. Honestly, I was dragging a bit. I wasn't exactly looking forward to running in the rain with a little bit of bronchitis. Since most of the weather forecast was for sprinkles, I brought with me a mylar blanket instead of a rain poncho. Per the final race instructions, I drove over and parked at lot 59 just off of Packard Dr. I could've parked a bit closer to the start line, but I opted for a parking spot under the solar panel roof to stay dry from the rain.
Parked at lot 59
Start line
First wave of the 10k at about 7:20 am
Ready for our wave start
Pascal!
Finish: 5:09:34
Click here for my Garmin data.
Finish line
I ended up crossing the finish line with a fellow Marathon Maniac from Canada. We leapfrogged each other during the last couple of miles. With chip timing, he finished well over 10 minutes faster than me.
I actually did okay without carrying my usual nutrition on me. I relied on my electrolyte drink where I only drank water at aid stations. I didn't need to refill my handheld bottle. I took a few of the Gatorade gels whenever they were being passed out. After almost 240 marathons, I was finally understanding that I was overeating in the past. No amount of salt or nutrition was going to revive bonked legs that have cramped up due to prolonged periods of overexertion. I need to continue to pace accordingly to my current level of fitness so that I'm not experiencing more discomfort than what is necessary for a marathon!
I'm glad that I decided to run this race and it turned out that this would be the last year for the marathon. Looks like going forward, this event's longest distance will be the half marathon. The Chinese conglomerate, Dalian Wanda Group, made it pretty clear that their focus would be on half marathons back in 2017 when they acquired the Rock n' Roll race series. Makes sense as the half marathon distance was definitely more profitable than the marathon. A lot of the marathon courses in their race series eventually were revised and involved a lot of snaking around parking lots or parks to make up the second 13.1 miles. That led to disgruntled marathoners until the marathon distance inevitably faded away.
Finisher medal
After grabbing a bottle of water, a bottle of Gatorade, and a couple of snacks, I continued down the finisher chute until I came to the exit and met up with my friend. They were also giving out bananas, but they were all freckled. I cannot stand freckled bananas.
Post race drinks and snacks
From there, my friend and I walked over to The ChuckBox for lunch. We came across some homeless people shouting indiscriminately at random people. Still not sure how each city will ever go about fixing the issue. It doesn't seem like one that can be fixed just by throwing money at it. It was getting a bit chilly on the walk over. I had to once again roll out the arm sleeves. Once we got there, we found the line to order was long, but it moved fairly quickly. When it was our time to order, I got the Great Big One with American cheese. The cook forgot my cheese which was quickly rectified. Once we paid and got our condiments, we snagged a table to enjoy our burgers. Mine was a delicious burger, much better than anything you can get at a fast food restaurant such as Whataburger. On our way out, we actually bumped into our friend, Mitch. His first option was packed, so he came here.
Menu
The Great Big One with American cheese
Since my friend was parked in the opposite directions, we went our separate ways. Once I got back to my car, I got my stuff in order before driving down to Arizona Mills to charge the car at the Tesla Supercharger. Originally, I was planning to charge it before heading to the race. However, I started thinking about all of the possible scenarios where things could go wrong being at the mall at dark o'clock. Instead I opted for some extra rest. It was a bit surprising for me to see that the parking lot for this mall was so packed. Do people still go to the mall these days, especially after years dealing with COVID? Apparently, they do. After plugging the car in to charge, I decided to go check it out. The only store that I had an interest to check out was the Nike Clearance Store. Along the way there, I saw a lot of dumbass people. Most of them looked to be in high school. Were we all assholes back at that age? Once I got to the store, I saw that a lot of people were also looking for shoes. The shoes were organized by size. Other than that, it was a treasure hunt. I found a couple pairs of decent running shoes but they weren't exactly cheap for clearance sales. They were still $99.99 for an older model. I'm still working through my current cache of running shoes, so I decided it would be best to pass.
Arizona Mills, Tempe, AZ
Later that evening, I hopped in the car and drove down to the Cracker Barrel in Chandler for dinner. After getting seated, I noticed that the waitress looked super swamped. When she came by to take my order, I mentioned that she looked really busy. She said yes and looked like she was ready to vent. I thought about ordering off of the dinner menu, but again, I went with my usual country boy breakfast with sirloin, hash brown casserole, and grits. When my food was brought out, I was a bit surprised to see that instead of a sirloin steak, I was given sirloin tips. I guess that made sense since sirloin tips was on the dinner menu. When I went to pay my bill, the cashier asked about my 48.6 perfect Dopey cap as well as my Carlsbad jacket. He seemed to be a well travelled person.
Cracker Barrel, Chandler
Country boy breakfast with sirloin tips, hash brown casserole, and grits
Monday 1/16
I woke up early, put on the morning news, and started packing for my trip home. I checked out of my unit at just ahead of the 8:30 am owner update. I drove over to the check-in office where I parked the car, dropped off the keys, and used the restroom before heading across the way for the owner update.
The owner update was an absolute joke. I checked-in, got my $100 AMEX gift card, and the $40 deposit was returned to me. I grabbed some snacks and a water and waited for my rep to come get me. The conversation lasted all of about 5 mins when they had me on the hook for max 55 minutes. Once he heard that I had attended an update last weekend, I had purchased 12k credits recently, and I had no questions about my ownership, he was not interested at all to talk with me. He pretty said that I was free to go. When I tried to continue the conversation, he practically opened the door to kick me out. Some of these salesmen are just not good people. Period. I need to keep that in mind and remind myself each time I attend these updates. They do not genuinely care about my welfare or wellbeing.
Pre-owner update snacks
Well the good thing with a very short owner update was that I could get on the road sooner. The first leg on my drive home took me out to Ehrenberg. Per the usual, after plugging the car in for a charge, I walked over to the Flying J Travel Center to use their restroom. However, this time, I didn't purchase anything before returning to my car.
Ehrenberg, AZ
I intended to drive out to either Indio or Cabazon for my second pitstop. However, when I approached each charging station, they looked to be full. So I continued on until I reached the Tesla Supercharger in Beaumont. Located right next to it was an In-n-Out. So after plugging in, I went inside to get lunch. Per the usual with any In-n-Out during lunch time, the place was packed! When I placed my order for a Double Double and a Neapolitan shake, the guy taking my order asked if I wanted my shake now or later. I said now would be good. I finished my shake before the burger was ready. However, when they called my number, a different employee gave me another shake with my burger. I purposely ordered only 1 burger to cut down on my caloric intake, but that was a wash when I ended up getting 2 shakes! :)
Beaumont, CA
Double Double and Neapolitan shake
After I finished my meal, I hopped in the car for the remainder of my drive home. The onboard navigation wanted me to take the 10 freeway, but instead I opted for the 60 which went fine and took a little over an hour to cover.
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